Too many cooks

Sunday

Jun 28, 2009 at 12:01 AMJun 28, 2009 at 9:14 AM

If General Motors and Chrysler are to have any hope of emerging from bankruptcy protection as successful companies, the decisions made for them now must be based on business factors, not political ones.

If General Motors and Chrysler are to have any hope of emerging from bankruptcy protection as successful companies, the decisions made for them now must be based on business factors, not political ones.

But already, politicians of both parties are interfering in the decisions about the closings of plants and dealerships.

Soon after bankruptcy was announced for GM, Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown was demanding to know from the Obama administration "why certain plants are being closed while others will remain open" and also warned GM against building cars overseas.

Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass, went to GM President and Chief Executive Officer Fritz Henderson, asking him to keep open a parts distribution center in his district, and GM complied.

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Urbana, blamed the president for GM's decision to close the Mansfield stamping plant, which is in his district, and accused the administration of "micromanaging" the auto industry. But then, ironically, he demanded that the administration reverse the company's decision.

Plant closings affect only a few states, including Ohio, but dealer closings will have a big impact nationwide.

A bipartisan group of 116 House members, led by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., sent a letter to the White House, asking President Barack Obama to delay the closing of GM and Chrysler dealerships until the list can be reviewed further. The letter also dangled the threat of legislation.

In May, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, proposed an amendment to a war-spending bill that would have required Chrysler to provide auto dealerships 60 additional days of notice before shutting them down. The measure was shot down as nongermane.

The congressional meddling was predictable and under- standable. These plants and dealerships are the lifeblood of many communities, and the jobs lost -- up to 100,000 from just the closed dealerships -- won't be replaced easily, if at all. Lawmakers don't want to see their constituents suffer, and they also will miss the campaign contributions from dealerships, which are loyal political donors.

But someone is bound to be harmed in the bankruptcy proceedings. Either GM and Chrysler do some paring and right-sizing or they fail, taking the jobs of tens of thousands more people with them and doing even more serious damage to the U.S. economy.

For the good of the whole, lawmakers need to step back and let these companies do what they must to regain their competitiveness.